Adelaide High School


Adelaide High School is a coeducational state high school situated on the corner of West Terrace and Glover Avenue in the Adelaide Parklands. It was the first government high school in South Australia. It currently has an enrolment of approximately 1,500 students.

History

In 1879, John Anderson Hartley, Catherine Helen Spence and others created the Advanced School for Girls in Grote Street, Adelaide. It was the first public secondary school in South Australia. The school was combined with the Adelaide Continuation School, and on 8 April 1908 the name was changed to Adelaide High School. This was the same year the South Australian state high school system was launched. Adelaide High School was officially opened on 24 September 1908 by the premier of South Australia, Thomas Price. It was the first secondary school in the Commonwealth of Australia.
In 1927, it had an enrolment of 1,067 students, making it the largest school of its kind in the Commonwealth. By 1929, due to increasing enrolments, the school occupied two sites; one site was at Grote Street and the other was at Currie Street. Due to the increasing enrolments, it was decided that a new building was required for Adelaide High School. The current site of the school on West Terrace was originally set aside for an army barracks in 1849, but in 1859 an observatory was built instead, which then became the Bureau of Meteorology in 1939.
Based on an award-winning 1940 design, a new building was erected on the site from 1947 to 1951. This became Adelaide Boys High School while Adelaide Girls High School remained in the buildings in Grote Street. An application was made to have the building listed as a Historic Building on the Australian Register of the National Estate. The nomination was on the basis of the building's "Art Modern" style and significance in Adelaide education. It had not led to the building's listing on the register as of 2007. The original Grote Street school buildings were listed on the register as a Historic site in 1980. As of 2007, the buildings were used as a centre for the performing arts. The buildings were considered to be among the Nationally Significant 20th-Century Buildings in South Australia.
In 1977, due to decreasing enrolments at both the Boys and the Girls schools, amalgamation began with Adelaide High School operating on two campuses – one on Grote Street and one on West Terrace. This arrangement ended in 1979, when all students were on the West Terrace site. In 1979, Adelaide High School became South Australia's Special Interest Language School, with students able to study up to seven languages: French, German, Latin, Modern Greek, Chinese, Spanish and Italian. Latin ceased to be offered in 2004 and was replaced by Japanese. Auslan was added as the eighth language in 2018.
Adelaide is part of the longest-running sporting exchanges with Melbourne High School and Mac.Robertson Girls' High School, both in Melbourne.

Curriculum

Adelaide High School is especially known for being a Special Interest Language School. It offers its students eight different languages to study: Modern Greek, Mandarin Chinese, Japanese, Italian, French, Spanish, German and Auslan. The school is also a Centre for the Hearing Impaired and an Associate School for Students of High Intellectual Potential. It has a selected entry process in its special interest cricket and rowing programs.

Languages

Adelaide High School is a Special Interest Language School and currently a sister school to Asahi High School in Osaka, Japan; IIS Quintino Sella in Biella, Italy, Heriburg Gymnasium in Coesfeld, Nord Rhein Westfalen, Germany, Lycée Saint Sauveur in Redon, Brittany, France, IES La Sisla in Sonsecas, Spain, Jinan Foreign Language School in Jinan, China, and the 7th High School of Corfu, Greece. Sister school visits, both inbound and outbound, take place regularly.

Facilities

Facilities that students have access to include a Library, gymnasium, weights room, tennis, basketball and netball courts, cricket nets and 4 ovals, Performing Arts Centre, science labs and lecture theatres. The school also has a boatshed on the bank of the River Torrens which holds the school's many rowing boats and where the school's rowing crews train. It also has a shared rowing facility at West Lakes with Unley High School and Norwood Morialta High School. A new wing, the Charles Todd Wing, was added to the southern side of the school in 2014. Building 4, previously housing the Languages, Art and Library areas, was upgraded and now contains the Languages, Maths and Arts learning areas.

Sport

The school has four "houses" which students represent in sporting and other events within the school. The houses took their names from past principals of the school. The house names are: Adey, Macghey, Morriss, and West. Sporting events include the intra-House Swimming Carnival and Athletics Carnival. The houses compete for the SJ Dowdy Cup, named after former Principal Stephen Dowdy. West won the cup in 2011 but Adey have won it from 2012 – 2017.
Adelaide High School has a range of girls' and boys' sporting teams and offers special interest sporting programs including cricket and rowing. They participate in games and regattas throughout the year which lead up to the main events. The 5 Highs Cricket Carnival is held in December against Melbourne High School, Sydney Boys' High School, Brisbane State High School and Kent Street Senior High School. The major rowing event is the Head of the River Regatta held in March or April. This regatta was jointly founded in 1922 by Adelaide High School and St Peter's College. Other sporting trips have the volleyball teams travelling to the Australian Volleyball Schools Cup in Melbourne, in December.
Since 1913, Adelaide High has taken part in a sporting exchange with Mac.Robertson Girls' High School and since 1910, Melbourne High School. This is the longest-running sporting exchange in the state. Both Exchanges compete for the Prefects' Cup. The exchanges are held in early Term 3 and each year the venue swaps: when the boys go to Melbourne the girls go to Adelaide and vice versa. There are competitions in many sports such as: Australian rules football, soccer, tennis, rowing, basketball, netball, softball, chess, debating, theatre sports, volleyball, cross country /athletics, badminton, table tennis and hockey. Sports previously played against Melbourne included lacrosse, baseball and field hockey. Adelaide High School currently holds the Melbourne Exchange Prefects' Cup after their most recent controversial win in 2017.

Head Master / Principal

NameYearsRef
William Adey1908–1920
Reginald A. West1920–1948
C.M. Ward1948–
A. E. Dinning1949–1954–
Wybert M. C. Symonds1954–1962–
A. H. Campbell1963–1968–
W. J. Bentley1969–1977–
Colin H. Brideson OAM1978–1987
Peter Sanderson1988–1997–
Stephen Dowdy1998–2011–
Anita Zocchi2011–T1 2017
Michael GurrT2 2017–
Cézanne GreenT3 2017–

Notable staff and students